Bitcoin Forum

Heya,

In case you missed it, here's an article from Bitcoin Magazine about it:

http://bitcoinmagazine.net/bitcoin-usage-for-political-donations-expands-to-vermont/

As well as his original press release:

http://vermontelection.org/2012/09/24/bitcoin/ (hmm, with a broken image).

I actually coded up and added to bitcoinbuilder.com all the stuff he researched would be necessary for anybody to legally accept Bitcoin donations for a political campaign:

https://www.bitcoinbuilder.com/donate/

I forwarded it to Mark Warden as well and he replied that his people would look into it.

I also wanted to point out that Jeremy Hansen's campaign is very interesting, and why I got in touch with him in the first place. He's a Computer Science professor running on a "Direct Democracy" platform that I think may just work.. see the /. article about him a while ago:

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/06/14/160233/vermont-senate-hopeful-jeremy-hansen-responds-on-mostly-direct-democracy

And check out the platform website he (and his supporters) have developed:

https://hansen.directrep.us/

(Phil Dodds running in Florida is also running on the same platform https://dodds.directrep.us/ )

Anyway, to me at least he seems like a candidate/idea worthy of some donations.. here's his direct donation link:

https://bitcoinbuilder.com/donate/?g=SFM9J8RP

Power to the People!  :D

josh!

Heh, I forgot that the word "platform" has different meanings based on context.  I was thinking software platform.  You are describing political platform, of course.

Interesting to see Bitcoin used for political campaign donations.  Here's the list of ones I'm aware of so far:

There is Mark Warden (NH State Rep):
 - http://www.howtoacceptbitcoin.com/2012/09/accepting-bitcoin-for-political.html


Eric Olson (running for U.S. Congress - ND ):
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=51631.0


@GovGaryJohnson was gifted a physical bitcoin in 2011.  
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=41892.msg606229#msg606229


and now Jeremy Hansen in Vermont.

This is great to see, and hopefully BitcoinBuilder can help a few more get on board.

joshbb-- you are my new hero. A bitcoin service targeting political donations. Brilliant!

Thanks!

Yeah, I guess it doesn't get much more "mainstream" than elected officials! :)

Ha, yeah being a programmer myself it was weird writing "platform" in a non-software sense too.

I just facebook messaged Eric Olson about it as well, especially since his bitcoin donation image and link are broken currently!

josh!

P.S. Consider donating something to Jeremy/Mark/Eric (once his works) as well!

Well, that's illegal and then some.  There's donation caps and disclosure rules and accounting issues with the exchange rates.

Eh, what's illegal?

The whole point of this service (as opposed to just putting up a global "donate to me" BTC address) is that it complies with all the caps, disclosure rules, and handles the accounting issues with the exchange rates.

Josh, wonderful work you are doing chipping away at the monopoly money industry structure's that retain power in the political arena for them and their friends. http://www.facebook.com/BitcoinBomb is a page I just started to document the developments in this segment of the bitcoin currency industry. Thanks again and I look forward to encouraging political candidates to use your service.

This is really cool

Just hoping this will tip bitcoin political donations to take off outside the US also

That is another first for the Bitcoin. I don't care whether he is having any chance of winning the elections or not. I'll donate at least 0.01 BTC for this bold step.

The current group of politicians I am consulting with might be more comfortable if they understood that a unique bitcoin receive address, (a receive address in the campaign's wallet or in their records), is generated for each unique contribution. Or, how is this managed? Is the address used to send the CryptoCurrency, that the donor uses to send the donation, is that tied to the personal information the donor enters on the form?

When an elections commission body audits the records of the donations of bitcoin made to a campaign, is there a report generated that shows enough data that it can be determined that the person that filled out the form is indeed the person who sent bitcoin to that, (the), address provided?

This is the primary concern of the candidates and managers and treasurers who I have spoken with. They are want to talk about damage and harm much more than a "solution". They need to be assured that the identifying information of the donor and their donation amount is visible, (on the blockchain?), and identifiable with the address they used ... thus ... provides an audit for government agencies for that transaction. And I'm moving their level of language up a few notches as they don't put it this way, because they don't know how to speak the language of coin, of Crypto, but I know what they need and want, and you do as well. So we need some set of diction, some language that allows these people to understand that can be legal and be safe.

And generally, there is a lot of fear among political candidates when approaching the CryptoCurrency campaign donations strategy, the implementation of that strategy. They would rather remain in absolute ignorance of CryptoCurrency, total ignorance ... and think they would be safe if they say nothing about it at all ... rather than even attempt to explore it in any fashion and then potentially be accused of accepting CryptoCurrency donations and then being audited for that without the knowledge, any knowledge at all to thwart or protect from harm from the State.

It's a damned if you do, damned if you don't proposition for some and that's not good for "the dream", which every political campaign must maintain to some degree. It's just not fluffy and good like those good old FRN's, so some marketing is my concern and I'm working to develop that language and level and ability to explain these things.

So these few candidates that are accepting bitcoin openly, they are the models, and their success with this strategy is absolutely crucial. How they generate, store and provide records for potential audits is crucial.

Can you speak to us please, at a high level, as if you are speaking to programmers who understand some bitcoin app code, as to how this is accomplished, thanks so much for your work and I look forward to having political candidates I consult with on these issues explore the use of your application.